Sunday, May 27, 2007

There are many, many pieces of beautiful Inuit and Alaskan Eskimo art available through dozens of Native American art resources in North America. You ought to be able to find something you love and just buy it.

By law, items made from marine mammal parts may not be shipped across the US/Canadian border without a special permit. This includes whale bone, walrus ivory and baleen. Getting a permit can be a long and difficult task. For many buyers, it is too much work to go through.

If you are Canadian resident, you can order and buy from any of several reputable Canadian dealers and have your purchase shipped to you without complication.

Similarly, if you are a US resident, you can purchase any item from our Arctic Room and have it shipped to your US residence in the course of normal business.

If you are Canadian and would like a list of Canadian sources that we feel you can rely on, contact us at sanibleart@comcast.net. We will tell you what we know.

We have been working on upgrading the order form at TribalWorks.com to secure status. We have more work to do but we have created a link from the original order form to the new secure form. So, if you happen to hit the order form button and are taken to the original order form you will find a second link that will take you to the secure order form. In most cases, however, clicking on the order form link icon will take you automatically to the secure order form.

March 4, 2007 was the date of an auction at Treadway/Toomey's Twentieth Century (Oak Park, IL) that included the sale of a collection of Native American items from collectors in Chicago and Las Vegas.

According to observers, a polychrome Mission basket with an estimate of $2,000 to $3,000 sold for $30,000. Two other high bid items were two Apache ollas of 12 inches and 21 inches, respectively , garnering $18,000 and $15,000. A Shoshone Panamint basket went for $18,000. A Navajo Germantown rug realized a price of $15,000. A Nez Perce/Plateau rifle scabbard sold for $5,000.

A large Hopi water jar, attributed to Frog Woman, went for $5,500. A San Ildefonso bowl with a carved top reached $7,000. One of the stars of the lots offered was a matched pair of beaded Sioux bags which realized in excess of $20,000.

Auction always are good guides to the market value of Native American art objects.

Members of more than 100 tribes will gather in Oklahoma City to celebrate and share in the richness and diversity of their heritage.

The event kicks off with a Benefit Auction on Thursday, May 31 at the Cox Convention Center, followed on June 1 by the Grand Parade at 10:30 AM, moving through the streets of downtown Oklahoma City.

Other events will include a 5K run and a 1 mile Fun Walk at Regatta Park along the Oklahoma River.

There also will be a juried art show and a native dance competition.

This is the 21st Annual Red Earth Festival. We first attended back in the late 80's. It has grown dramatically since then. But we still treasure the acquaintances we made in those days with talented Native American artists, many of whom had works featured on our first Web site.

Saturday, May 26, 2007

Here's a list of Museum of Indian Arts and Culture doings in Santa Fe that you might find helpful.

May 26, 2007 (today): It's not too late if you live inthe SAnta Fe area (or traveling there this weekend) to take advantage of the MIAC Native Treasures-Indian Arts Festival. 120 excellent Native American artists will be offering their creations for sale. Call 505-476-1250 for more information. Or visit nativetreasuressantafe.org

May 27, 2007: Native Treasures-Indian Arts Festival continues.

July 27, 2007: The Joy of Cooking Pueblo Feast Food will feature the cooking and enthusasm of Serina Hena, one of Tesuque Pueblos best traditional cooks. She will show and discuss how to make five feast day dishes, from horno bread to stew. For information, 505-476-1250. Ask for Penny.

September 14, 2007: Archaic Pictographs and Structures near Las Vegas, NM. will visit spectacular, virtually unknown Late Archaic sites on a large private ranch near Las Vegas. According to the MIAC, this land has sites that are from the 500 BC to 500AD period and are not accessible to the public.

If you are interested in native or tribal art from this part of the world, you might also visit the Arctic Room at our TribalWorks web site. We have several Arctic, Inuit and PNW pieces available for sale, including in a second section.

The Museum of Indian Arts and Culture in Santa Fe is one of our favorites. Although we must confess to spending half our time on Museum Hill at the Wheelwright, where even the Case Trading Post is a museum-esque experience.

Getting back to the MIAC, however, a new exhibit opened there on May 20, 2007, featuring four monumental bronzes by Tammy Garcia of Blue Rain Gallery in Taos.

The four bronzes, each more than six feet tall, will be on display in the courtyard and inside the main entrance of the MIAC. The exhibitions will run through April 27, 2008

It is entitled, “Origins in Tradition”, a name that Ms. Garcia has stated is “…such an appropriate title because I have built my success by drawing inspiration from my rich heritage and, at the same time, not allowing myself to be bound by it.”

Museum director, Shelby Tisdale, commented, “Tammy is a visionary artist. She creates a delicate balance between a sense of place that is expressed in her pueblo worldview and the vitality of modern day life, no matter what medium she is working in.”

We remember Tammy from the days her original gallery opened on Paseo Norte in Taos. We would stop in frequently to see her latest creations in exquisite pottery. She would never disappoint.

We are pleased to see stretching out into bronze and glass.

At the current time, Native-PotteryLink, our web site specializing in pottery from American Indian artisans and pueblo potters does not have any of Tammy’s work in stock. We hope to remedy that in the near future. Many of her colleagues and contemporaries, however, are included in our inventory and displayed on the site. You are invited to visit.

Of course, this is not a recent development. Americans have long been ceding commemoration to shopping and cooking out.

This year, however, it seems especially sad, since whether one agrees with the war or not, valiant defenders of our nation and freedom are falling on distant battlefields.

Why can’t we all turn back to the original intent of Memorial Day?

To recognize and commemorate the fallen in battle?

It seems such a shame that the people of this nation, to whom so much has been given, including ample time off and holidays to shop or party, should be so self-consumed that they can’t take one day to remember our heroes. Let’s do it this Memorial Day. Have all the fun you can have this Saturday and Sunday. But take a break on Monday, Memorial Day. Reflect. In gratitude and sorrow.

We owe it to each other and ourselves. Most of all, to the departed, who left us, without hesitation, with only the most heroic intentions.

Sunday, May 20, 2007

Santa Fe, NM - Dr. Bruce Bernstein, a current SWAIA Board member, will take on a larger role for that organization over the next several months leading up to the Santa Fe Indian Market.Bernstein will act as a management consultant, assisting the Board and the staff in their preparations for the upcoming Indian Market in August.

“We felt that the staff was very capable of executing the Indian Market,” explains Board Chair, Vivian Arviso.“But given the recent departure of our Executive Director, we felt it would be fairer to them to have some extra help.We are fortunate to have a Board with diverse backgrounds and to be able to call upon individual members.”

Bernstein is a familiar face in Santa Fe. He brings a rich background with him when it comes to Native American art and the Santa Fe Indian Market, in particular.He is currently a senior scholar in the Smithsonian’s Anthropology Department in Washington, D.C., where he is finishing research and writing projects on Native arts, including the Santa Fe Indian Market.Prior to that position, he was the Assistant Director for Cultural Resources at the Smithsonian’s NationalMuseum of the American Indian.Before leaving New Mexico he had been the Director and Chief Curator of the Museum of Indian Arts & Culture for ten years, and held positions at the WheelwrightMuseum of the American Indian and UNM’s Maxwell Museum of Anthropology.He is widely published and has curated numerous exhibitions on American Indian art.A SWAIA Board member for the past four years, he has been involved with the organization as a volunteer and judge for over 25 years.

“Very few people know the Santa Fe Indian Market as well as Bruce does,” states Arviso.“He knows the artists, he knows the collectors, and he knows the organization.I think he will provide a great deal of help during our transition period.”

The SWAIA Board has launched a search for a new Executive Director, whom they hope to identify and hire by September.

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Aboriginals: Art of the First Person is proud to be a business member and support of Southwestern Association of Indian Arts.

SWAIA's Santa Fe Indian Market 2007, it's 86th annual, is coming up on August 18-19.

According to Southwestern Association for Indian Arts (SWAIA), hundreds of positions are available to interested volunteers.

As with non-profit organization events, without volunteers, the Indian Market would not be able to go forward.

Claire E. Black Eagle, SWAIA Volunteer Services, says, "Besides helping behind the scenes at the largest Native American art event in the country, one also gets the privilege of meeting new people from all over the world, as well as artists that volunteer their time."

If you are in the Santa Fe area, or plan to be there in August, contact Claire E. Black Eagle at volunteer@swaia.org for more information or to sign up. She also can be reached at 505-983-5220, ext.234.

The owners of Aboriginals Gallery, also operators of ZuniLink, Native-JewelryLink, Native-PotteryLink and TribalWorks, also will be there to help out. In fact, William Ernest Waites, who also is a writer will be filing daily blog reports and photos about Indian Market. Make a point to set your bloglines alert to let you know when updates to the blog have been posted.

Probably suitable to follow a blog about turquoise with one about the other staple of Native American jewelry, silver.

If you haven't been paying attention to it or are not an investor in precious metals, you might not know that silver is currently at near record prices, the highest in 25 years.

How can the jewelry industry create so much demand?

It's not just jewelry that uses silver. The metal also is used in computers, cell phones and other electronics, and photography. When used in such applications it is very difficult to recycle, which means it is pretty much gone forever.

As a result, stockpiles of silver are disappearing while demand goes up.

On top of that, silver is in demand in jewelry in China and India, two huge and growing markets.

So, silver currently is about $13 per ounce.

What impact is this having on the creation of Native American jewelry? We haven't really seen a major move upward in cost yet. If the pattern follows gold, which also has soared in cost, the artists may just stop using it. Although it is hard to imagine what would replace it, since it is far more fundamental to Native American Indian jewelry.

We can say that, in the short term, the rise in silver prices has not been reflected in the prices of Native American Indian jewelry at pace-setting Native-JewelryLink. We have not raised our prices even as the cost of silver goes up. We don't price based on replacement cost, but rather based on the original acquisition cost. What we bought at lower prices stays those prices.

Click on the link to look at a wide selection of the finest in Native American Indian jewelery by a wide spectrum of artists from the very reasonable to the very high end.

Incidentally, if you are inclined to order from the web site, our secure order form is assurance that your credit card data is safe from prying eyes.

I recently discovered a discussion group on Yahoo that features turquoise – before it finds its way into Native American or any other jewelry. The group, American Turquoise Mines, continually interests me as the members discuss various “varieties” of turquoise, based on the mine it is believed to originate from.

So far as I can tell, these are almost exclusively miners of turquoise, resellers of raw turquoise or lapidaries who cut, slice and polish it for use in jewelry made by others.

I may be wrong, but there appears to be a decided dislike for Chinese, as opposed to American, turquoise. Maybe I am just reading that into comments in a group that focuses on American turquoise. At the very least, they get upset about Chinese turquoise that is misidentified by sellers as “American.” Rightly so.

They also evaluate the turquoise being offered on eBay and the sellers of that material. Helpful, if not completely authoritative. Take it with a grain.

Did you have any idea that there were that many turquoise mines – in the U.S., no less?

One recent subject of extensive discussion was (Sacred) White Buffalo turquoise. Some commenters believe it is not turquoise at all, but some similar material. Others believe it is genuine turquoise by chemical and physical analysis that’s whiteness is simply very pale blue.

Quoting from one member of the group -

“When discovered in the Dry Creek Mine on the Shoshone Indian Reservation near Battle Mountain, Nevada in 1993, they were not sure what it was. Because of its hardness, it was decided to send it to have it assayed and their suspicions proved correct; it was in fact Turquoise. It was not until 1996 however that it was finally made into Jewelry.

“Turquoise gets its color from the heavy metals in the ground where it forms. Blue turquoise forms when there is copper present, which is the case with most Arizona turquoises. Green turquoise forms where iron is present, the case with most Nevada turquoises. Sacred Buffalo Turquoise forms where there was no heavy metal present, which turns out to be a rare occurrence. The lack of any specific color consistency makes this stone distinctive and unique from other turquoises.

“Because this turquoise is so rare, the Indians have named it “Sacred Buffalo” turquoise.”

Native American Indian jewelry relies heavily on turquoise for gem material. Since the raw turquoise used costs more or less depending on the quality and rarity of stone, it also influences the cost of he jewelry in which it appears. Of course there are other factors as well, including the skill and reputation of the jewelry maker.

Nevertheless, the more you know about turquoise, the sharper you will be as a Native American jewelry buyer.

You'll find a number of outstanding turquoise pieces at our Native-JewelryLink web site. Where we know the source mine, we quote it. We intend to be even more diligent in determining the variety. Often, the artist doesn't know.

Monday, May 14, 2007

We used to chuckle when people would visit our Sanibel gallery, Aboriginals: Art of the First Person, and comment that they loved our art but would wait until they visited Santa Fe, where the prices would be lower.

Obviously, those people had never been to Santa Fe. We have, and return regularly. It is a special place.

There is a certain cachet to buying tribal art in Santa Fe. But price isn't part of it.

We know that our prices, even when we had the physical gallery, were never higher than those in Santa Fe and usually lower.

We understand. Santa Fe is a high-rent district. Galleries there, as with all galleries everywhere, must pay their rent and their staff.

The money to do that must be baked into the price of every object of art they sell. There is no other way to do it.

Now we read in the Santa Fe New Mexican newspaper that galleries and shops in downtown Santa Fe are in a crunch. Rents remain high but traffic is down, largely because of extensive construction downtown.

One gallery owner is quoted as saying, “Downtown Santa Fe has lost its vibrancy.”

We don’t want to dump on Santa Fe. We love the place. Its art, its culture, its dining and its climate truly make it “The City Different.”. We sincerely hope it recovers and quickly.

But rest assured that you don’t have to go to Santa Fe or even shop online with Santa Fe dealers to get quality, authentic, Native American jewelry, pottery, folk art and fetish carvings at excellent prices. And with service that you will tell your friends about.

Sunday, May 13, 2007

There are certain occurrences in life that tend to represent "tipping points" in the human consciousness.

Without placing too much importance on it, William Waites, co-owner of Aboriginals Gallery, considers that the use of the term “internet pricing” by a local retailer may be one of those benchmarks.

When Aboriginals closed our physical gallery on Sanibel Island in Florida to operate exclusively online, we commented on how it allowed us to reduce our prices because we had reduced our overhead.

(As it turned out, the overhead reduction was not as dramatic as we had anticipated, what with other business costs replacing those that were eliminated or reduced. But that is another story.)

Generally, we have been able to reduce our prices by about 30% averagely across the board - before including special sales such as our recently ended April Foolishness reduction of 30 %.

Now, we hear that the concept of lower prices on the internet has permeated other merchants and businesses, including some with massive bricks and mortar cost structures. Hence, a local jeweler is running radio and television commercials claiming the prices in its stores are "internet prices."

So, I guess it is now indisputable common knowledge that the same items cost less when purchased via the internet.

This leaves the only impediments to internet shopping being the reliability of the seller and the suitability of the item when actually evaluated in hand.

We attempt to solve both the problems by pointing out that we have been in the tribal arts business since 1979, 28 years.

Over that time, with thousands of sales, we have had very few returns from people who did not want the item once they had it physically available for inspection.

Sometimes it has been a size problem. Sometimes a color problem. (Both size and color information have limitations on the internet.)

Occasionally it has been that an item purchased for display purposes that was not perceived to look right in the intended space when it was “tried on.”

To be fully candid, we also had one item returned when the purchaser located an “expert” who claimed the item was not what it was purported to be. We took it back with a full refund – our standard policy on authenticity issues when we are notified within 30 days.

We researched the challenge and found that it was debatable as to whether the attribution was 100% accurate or not.

Nevertheless, we accepted the return. No big deal. Just the way we are.

Extreme Makeover: Home Edition has selected a Navajo family, the Yazzies of Arizona, for a makeover of their home. Previously living in a double-wide mobile home without plumbing, insulation and other comforts that average Americans take for granted, the Yazzie family struggled to provide warmth in their home.

Burning coal, a heating mainstay of Navajo structures was not possible since one of the Yazzie children, Gwendolyn, has severe asthma and suffers from epilepsy.Coal smoke would have been hazardous to her health.

Her brother, 13-year-old Garrett, went to work creating a solar heater using aluminum cans and old automotive parts. The task was accomplished with the help of internet research, mentors and many trips to the local junkyards for material.

Recognition Garrett’s initiative and innovation led to the Extreme Makeover producer selecting the Yazzie family to be on the receiving end of a replacement home constructed by HomeLife Communities. The effort was recorded on video from April 12 to April 17.

The new home was constructed in the style of a traditional Navajo Hogan and was faithful to the green and earth-friendly traditions of the Navajo people.

Scheduled airing of the program, and the famous Ty Pennnington line, “Good Morning, Yazzie family,” is yet to be announced.

You can watch Extreme Makeover: Home Edition on ABC on Sunday evenings.

Saturday, May 12, 2007

According to the US Census of 2000, just 553 individuals speak the Oneida language, with 429 of them living in Wisconsin.

In an effort to perpetuate what would otherwise be a dying language, the University of Wisconsin at Green bay has created a web site, in collaboration with a tribal elder from Oneida, to promote and sustain the language of the Oneida. Professor Clifford Abbot and 96-year-old Maria Hinton are using the Web site to transform a printed dictionary of this oral language into an online database, including sound samples.

The Oneida language is part of the Iroquoian family of languages and related more distantly to Cherokee.

According to Abbot and Hinton, approximately 4,000 words, with about 900 sounds, have been placed on the Web site.

Oneida reservations are located in New York and Ontario, Canada, in addition to Wisconsin.

This news brief about Native American culture is brought to you by Aboriginals Gallery, a suite of online Web sites that offer authentic, guaranteed Native American and other tribal art from the Navajo, Zuni, Hopi and Arctic peoples.

Lots of activity at the NationalMuseum(s) of the American Indian in coming days.

In Washington, DC, “Identity by Design: Tradition, Change, and Celebration in Native Women’s Dresses” will be open through January 2, 2008. The exhibition examines the individual, communal and cultural identity of Native women as reflected in their dresses and their artistry in creating them.

Also in Washington, "Return to a Native Place: Algonquian Peoples of the Chesapeake" is an ongoing show of photographs, maps, ceremonial and everyday objects giving evidence of the continuing, since the 1600s, presence of the Nanticoke, Powhatan and Piscataway Tribes in the Chesapeake area.

Three additional ongoing exhibitions at the NMAI in DC feature “Our Universe”, “Our Peoples” and “Our Lives”. The first focuses on cosmologies of the Native communities and the spiritual relationships between them and the earth. The second tells the stories, and 500 years of history, of eight different indigenous Native tribes through their own words. The third reveals how the members of eight Native communities live, and preserve and express their identity within the complexities of the 21st Century

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Shows in the nation’s capitol are presented at the NMAI on the Mall.

Meanwhile, the New Yorkvenue of the NMAI is offering four shows on its own.

“Off the Map: Landscape in the Native Imagination” will run through September 3, 2007.The Native artists featured in the show examine landscape from the complex perspectives of home, culture and identity, all aspects of the “land” for them.

“Beauty Surrounds Us” runs through September 23, 2008, presenting 77 works of Native art from the museum’s collection. This show inaugurates the new Diker Pavilion for Native Arts and Cultures.

“Indigenous Motivations: Recent Acquisitions from the NationalMuseum of he American Indian” concludes its appearance on June 10, 2007. This show focuses on the works the NMAI has acquired since 1990, including the massive George Gustave Heye collection.

Finally, in New York, “Born of Clay: Ceramics from the NationalMuseum of the American Indian” closes at the end of this month. This is a pottery-lovers feast of works by eight Native potters from four regions (the Andes, eastern North America, Mesoamerica, and the southwestern US).

All New York shows are at the GeorgeGustaveHeyeCenter. More information on all shows is available at the NMAI web site.

Funded by the Puyallup Tribe and led by a former chair of the Skokomish people, the Fife, Washington, school system will begin teaching about local native history and relationships between tribal and other governments as part of the history curriculum.

The courses are in response to a 2005 WashingtonState law that encourages the teaching of American Indian history and culture in public school districts.

This Tribal Artery news brief is brought to you by the owners of Aboriginals Gallery, an online source for items of Native American and other tribal art.

Friday, May 11, 2007

Our congratulations go to Marvin Oliver (Quinault/Isleta) for his selection as poster artist for the 2007 SWAIA Santa Fe Indian Market.

Oliver is the first glass artist to receive this honor. An example of his work will appear on the poster promoting this year's Indian Market.Entitled, "Shaman Tells the Raven's Tale", the work combines classic Northwest Coast style with traditional Southwest color palette.

In addition to his art, Oliver also serves as Professor of American Indian Studies and Art at the University of Washington, serves part-time at the University of Alaska-Ketchikan, serves as Adjunct Curator of Contemporary Native American Art at the Burke Museum and maintains a gallery, Alaska Eagle Arts, in Ketchikan. He was the first non-Italian artist to be commissioned for a public art piece in Perugia, Italy, Seattle's sister city.

This year's Indian Market will take place in August again. As usual, William & Susanne Waites, owners of Aboriginals Gallery, and its allied Web sites, ZuniLink, Native-JewelryLink, Native-PotteryLink and TribalWorks, and publishers of Tribal Artery will be blogging from there with the latest news about winning artists, events and general observations about Santa Fe and the Market.

If you would like to be among the first to know about Indian Market news, why not subscribe now to a feed for the blog. You'll find the various feed possibilities in the sidebar at the right. Then, when the news comes, you will get an alert that it has been posted to the Tribal Artery blog.

For examples of the coverage from last year, look at our postings from August/September 2006 in our archives.

Wednesday, May 09, 2007

William Waites and Susanne Waites have just added four previously unlisted vintage Australian Aboriginal spears to the Website at TribalWorks.These are authentic works of tribal art by Australian Aborigines from the Tiwi Islands (Bathurst & Melville) and the Central Desert.Each of these spears dates back at least to approximately the 1960s and was acquired in Australia.To view the spears, and other Australian Aboriginal carvings in greater detail, visit TribalWorks and navigate to the Australian Room and then to the carvings gallery.Please note that we are showing only the top portion of the spears her. The full length extends between 61" and 86".